THE DOOR INTO SHADOW DIANE THE DOOR into shadow DUANE The Wound is healed by the sword that deals it; the heart is knit by the pain that breaks it; the life is made whole by the death that starts it; the death is made whole by the life that ends it. (Hamartics, 186) Four lands hemmed in by mountain and waste and the Sea — those were the Middle Kingdoms: and the greatest of them, Arlen and Darthen, were in peril of destruction. For seven years Arlen's throne had been empty of the royalty needed to keep the land fertile and the people at peace. And Darthen suffered as a result of Arlen's lack, for the Two Lands were bound together by oaths of friendship and by joint maintenance of the royal sorceries that kept their lands safe from the ever-present menace of the Shadow. In those days there appeared a man with the blue Fire — not just the spark of Flame that every man and woman possesses, but enough to channel and use to change the world around him. His lover was the child of Arlen's last king, heir to his usurped throne. In the Firebearer's relationship to Freelorn, King Ferrant's son, many later saw the Goddess's hand. She had been working quietly, so as not to alarm Her old adversary the Shadow. Her hand seemed visible elsewhere too. Freelorn had taken com-panions with him into his exile. They lived as outlaws and bandits, stealing what they needed when they had to — though none of their hearts were in it. One of them in particular would certainly have been elsewhere, if she had had a choice. Swordswoman and sorcer-ess, trained in the Silent Precincts and in every other place in the Kingdoms that dealt in the use and mastery of the blue Fire that some women bear, Segnbora d'Welcaen tai-Enraesi was a spectacu-lar and expensive failure.


1 из 291